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templates are specified by business process modeling languages and composed of
business process patterns. From solution space models, a particular product, i.e.,
a business process model is derived by removing or adding parts of it. Finally,
mapping models
define mapping relations between problem space and solution
space models. They regulate which parts might be removed from the business
process model according to the selected features from the problem space model.
Given such a representation of business process families, we have to guaran-
tee that each process model, that is built according to a feature configuration,
does not violate any well-formedness constraints of the business process model
template. Due to the size of contemporary business process families, it is time
consuming, costly and error-prone to manually validate that each configuration
has a well-formed corresponding business process model. For these reasons, an
automated approach for the constraint validation is necessary.
To address this problem, in this paper, we propose a classification of interre-
lationships between elements of business process models and demonstrate how
this classification can be used for the validation. The classification is based on
an analysis of basic workflow patterns, a set of conceptual basis for process lan-
guages. This classification is specified in Description Logics (DL), which we use
as means of validating business process templates.
2 Application Context of Business Process Families
A typical SPL consists of three kinds of artifacts, representing its problem space,
solution space and mappings between the problem and solution space [3]. We
introduce one such SPL, a part of the Electronic Store (e-store) SPL [4].
Fig. 1 depicts a snippet of the business process family of the e-store case
study. The representation contains a feature model to represent commonality
and variability of the business process family, a business process model template,
specified in the Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN) and mappings
between features and elements of the business process model template.
Interdependencies in the feature model are specified with
mandatory
and
op-
tional
parent-child relationships and
alternative
and
or feature groups
.A
manda-
tory
parent-child relationship specifies that if a parent feature is selected in a
certain configuration, its mandatory child feature has to be too (e.g.,
E-Shop
and
StoreFront
). An
optional
parent-child relationship specifies a possibility of
the selection, e.g.,
StoreFront
and
WishList
.An
alternative feature group
,or
xor
feature group
,(e.g.,
Basic
and
Advanced
), specifies that when their parent feature
is selected,
exactly one
of the members of the group can be selected. Finally, an
or group
(e.g.,
Emails
,
ProductFlagging
and
AssignmentToPageTypesForDisplay
)
defines a set of features from which at least one has to be selected.
Feature models also contain interdependencies between features that are not
captured by the tree structure of feature diagrams, called cross-tree constraints,
namely
includes
and
excludes
.
Includes
means that if an including feature is in
a configuration, the included feature has to be as well (e.g.,
EmailWishList
and
Registration
).
Excludes
is the opposite to
includes
.
